The Story Of The New “Dream Portraits”

Starting around 2002, my focus changed from creating abstract figurative works to creating abstract expressionism paintings, as well as pure abstract paintings. But recently, the challenge of doing abstract figurative work with a multimedia approach has become my newest focus. Thus, I have begun a new series of paintings that are based on dreams I have had in the past and some new dreams I’ve had recently. I call this new series “Dream Portraits”.

The first Dream Portrait was painted in the summer of 2017 and is called “Suit Head With Exploding Thoughts”. The dream I had
imagined myself as an entrepreneur/ investor having that famous “Eureka” moment of believing that I have discovered “the next big thing”. My head exploded with thoughts of imagining great new innovation and wealth.
The painting utilizes acrylic paint, acrylic inks, metallic inks, oil based Pebeo, and finished with resin. The metals used are silver door knobs for the nose and the mouth. At the top of the head are small brass elbows.

The second portrait was completed in the last couple months of 2017. It is a much more conventional approach to the human features than the first Dream Portrait. This portrait was inspired by a dream that took me back to the Renaissance. I think I was heavily influenced by those historical TV shows like Versailles and Victoria. I imagined myself as a trusted advisor of the king on my way to a grand ball hosted by the king and spotting a beautiful woman looking back at me. The painting is called “My Lady”. The media used in this painting is acrylic paint, acrylic ink, metallic ink, liquid Pebeo, Pebeo in a tube, copper plating, and silver colored beads.

I have currently just started working on the third multimedia Dream Portrait. This one stems from a dream about the distant future. A future where the distinction between human intelligence and artificial intelligence is blurring. The human I met in this dream is turning into a robot but still trying to hold onto his inner human love….. by crossing his arms and embracing himself.

More to come on this Dream Portrait and future Dream Portraits as the paintings progress.